What a horrible consequence, he says, that a Supreme Court decision should result in protracted litigation between a prosecutorial government, bent on depriving defendants of their liberty or their lives, and defendants, who want both. Seems to me that’s what happens in every criminal court room in every town in America every day. We used to call that the normal functioning of a civil society. Roberts now calls it an aberration.

Roberts derides this Supreme Court ruling because it “benefits” lawyers? (Always meaning “their” lawyers, not “ours”, as if he were describing the hired help and the country club owners.) One would think that all his Court’s decisions are designed to benefit the law and lawyers, defense and prosecution, and judges, and the huge bureaucracy that administers government’s rules and holds those engaging in fringe behavior in jail, to lessen the harm they cause others.

Roberts is distraught that Boumediene addresses only a few of the questions created by the President’s ad hoc system of prisons and the kangaroo courts meant to fill them. That is, of course, what most appellate decisions do. Answer some of the questions, and leave the working out of facts and details to the lower courts. It’s a particularly ironic criticism, since Roberts uses that technique to his advantage when he vivisects existing rulings of his Court, attempting to overturn them without political liability. The Court’s recent decisions on workplace and racial discrimination and voter ID laws come to mind.

Lastly, he resorts to a tired lament about his Court addressing “unimportant” matters. Gitmo is a “quirky” outpost of America’s imperial holdings. Hence, whether habeas extends to the government’s [little brown] prisoners there is unworthy of his Court’s attention. Never mind that we claim not to be an imperial power, replete with torturers and secret prisons, that we claim to promote liberty, not chaos and destruction. Roberts’ racial, xenophobic overtones are unmistakable, as is the notion that the Constitution never restricts the President’s conduct to what is lawful, it only empowers him to do what is “necessary”. That may accurately reflect Roberts’ politics. It sure ain’t the law.

“enhanced” or reinstituted?

What a bonehead.

awareness and caring are totally separate things for such a [fillintheblanketyblank]path!

Bahbydawlin. Look what you hatched. Just LOOK! yep, they’re your genes.

more than 36,000 residents in 26 communities had been evacuated from their homes

Is Bush going to pretend to care about this or is it up to St. McCain to wander around, hug a few people, and mime guitar playing?